


radio ga ga

by messofthejess



Series: rebel rebel, Simon Simon [1]
Category: Carry On Series - Rainbow Rowell
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Multi, Oblivious Simon Snow, POV Simon Snow, Punk Ass Pitch AU, Teenage Rebellion, gratuitous Queen references, is it queer to sing Queen to the gargoyles on a rooftop by yourself?, mostly the end is fluff, the very definition of a bisexual disaster
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-15
Updated: 2018-12-15
Packaged: 2019-09-18 14:24:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16996695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/messofthejess/pseuds/messofthejess
Summary: The Mage took away Baz's records. Simon wants to get them back.Takes place during Chapter 8 of "rebel rebel" by BasicBathsheba.





	radio ga ga

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BasicBathsheba](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BasicBathsheba/gifts).
  * Inspired by [rebel rebel](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15485421) by [BasicBathsheba](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BasicBathsheba/pseuds/BasicBathsheba). 



> _So don't become some background noise_
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> _A backdrop for the girls and boys_
> 
>  
> 
> _Who just don't know, or just don't care_
> 
>  
> 
> _And just complain when you're not there_
> 
>  
> 
> _You've had the time, you've had the power_
> 
>  
> 
> _You've yet to have your finest hour_
> 
>  
> 
> ~ "Radio Ga Ga", Queen
> 
> The return of Baz's records is such a pivotal point in "rebel rebel" that I wanted to explore more of what happened from Simon's perspective. If you haven't read that fic, you'll want to do so before reading this one (and you should just go read RR anyway, it's fantastic).

For the record, I have never hated Baz’s music. There have been days when I wanted to smash every vinyl in his collection because the very existence of sound was too much for me to handle, but that’s not the music’s fault. And it’s certainly not the music’s fault that it’s owned by a right prick who likes to mock me with it whenever I’m feeling my worst (“Boys Don’t Cry”? Really, Baz?) (He made me hate The Cure, the tosser.) (Except for “Friday I’m in Love.” Nobody can take away my love for that song.)

 

Before I came to Watford, I barely had a sense of what music _was_ , aside from the scattering of nursery rhymes I’d picked up from my first few care homes. The front desk ladies had a radio that was usually more static than sound, and they always wanted to listen to the BBC news station instead of anything with pop tunes. Then the Mage brought me to Watford, and Baz steamrolled into my life with his record player and denim jacket with the half-rotten banana on the back (Seriously, what is up with that thing? What band wants that as their logo?). And at the age of eleven, I finally got a proper education in music.

 

I’ll never tell Baz, but his records actually help me a lot in classes. When I first started here, _everything_ was hard. Elocution especially. I was never that strong of a reader, or much of a talker, which kind of puts a dent in trying to do anything with magic. Mumbling your way through a spell is a surefire way to, well, set something on fire, or do a lot worse. Turns out you have to have some exposure to culture in order to be good at casting spells; words are the medium that let your power flow through. I definitely had the power supply working for me—I practically overflow with magic, filling the room with heady smoke when I get pissed off. But I didn’t have the channel.

 

Penny helped sort me out with the basics, like how to hold my wand properly. Everything else came from the music. I can’t always figure out what the magical intention of lyrics are supposed to be (although “ ** _Don’t stop me now!_** ” seems to give you something close to invincibility if you say it with the right punch), but mouthing along to Baz’s albums gave me something for my brain to cling onto.

 

But again, I’ll never tell Baz that.

****

No matter what’s going on between Baz and I, the music is always there, winding through the gaps between us.

 

Bauhaus plays when I tell him that I go to care centers every summer when I’m not at Watford. I’d just crashed into the room after getting zapped by the gate in the Wavering Wood, and I decided to cop a place on the floor instead of moving to my bed. I probably genuinely hurt myself that go-around, but you think Baz would help me up? Nah. Instead he cranks up “Starman” and goes back to reading after I’ve stopped being interesting to him.

 

(I don’t hate Bowie, not really. I just think he’s fucking weird as hell. Plus, Baz reminds me of him a bit, with the slicked hair and jutting cheekbones, only a bit darker. Looks far better than Bowie, honestly.)

 

(Baz did seem surprised by the care centers thing. I suppose it would be a bit of a shock to someone who’s always had the security of family and home waiting for you. For me it’s always been an inevitability. Never stay in one place too long, don’t put down any roots. Ever since the Mage first brought me to Watford, I move under the pretense of making it so the Humdrum can’t find me as easily. Doesn’t matter much to me at any rate. I don’t make friends in the care centers; if anything, the other kids usually end up scared of me.)

 

I play “Starman” back to Baz when Penny and I make it back through the gate our third year. We’d been gone for a handful of weeks, and when I got to the room, Baz looked like hell. Wrapped up in his blankets, the window wide open even though it was the dead of winter, and dead silence in the room. I knew something was wrong when I couldn’t hear the record player on the other side of our door. Of course he wouldn’t tell me what the problem was, only begged for me to go away in the hoarsest, most pathetic voice I’d ever heard. So I flick on his iPod and stomp downstairs for dinner so Baz has the space he needs to sort himself out.

 

Simon & Garfunkel floats through the background when I tell Baz about going to the werewolf den at the beginning of our fourth year. It’s also what helps Penny and I cross over the selkie-filled waters at the hidden beach to retrieve that book of prophecies the Mage wanted. “ ** _Bridge over troubled water!_** ” fell out of my mouth like it’d been a spell I’d practiced all my life. Penny had gushed over it to Baz when we got back, much to his annoyance, I think. Baz was probably annoyed that I’d taken a metaphorical lyric and made it literal through a spell, but who fucking cares if it works, yeah?

 

The Velvet Underground. Soft Cell. The Buzzcocks (ugh). Billy Joel. Modern Lovers. Led Zeppelin. The Ramones. Countless other long-haired bands and raspy singers who crackled through the air like they’d smoked a carton before recording. The music always spoke when we couldn’t talk to each other.

 

That’s why it hurt so much when the Mage took it all away. Silence really is deafening.  

 

****

 

We’re summoned to the Mage’s office, Baz and I, a week after the stairs incident. The nurse sent a little bird after I left the infirmary saying I’d been injured, and apparently it took the bird three days to find the Mage, and another three days for the Mage to get back to Watford from wherever he was with his Men. Feels stupid to have this conversation with him now, though. All the more ridiculous rumors about what happened have died out for the most part. (My favorite was the one where Baz flung me down the stairs with “ ** _Mama said knock you out!_** ”.) (Because it’s just like Baz to use a lyric to spell me unconscious, yet I guarantee that’s not the first song he would have picked.) Everyone else has moved on, including me, but the Mage is five steps behind.

 

“Why couldn’t he send something a little less ostentatious?” Baz gripes, plucking another bright green feather off of his jumper. The Mage sent a parrot up to the top floor of Mummer’s House, all puffed up from the cold.

 

“S’pose he didn’t want us to ignore it,” I reply. I agree, though—having a parrot scream  _The Mage would like to see you now! The Mage would like to see you now!_ over and over was annoying. Plus he could have chosen something a little more suited to England, like a barn owl or something.

 

We’re silent as we make our way over to the Mage’s office. Baz doesn’t seem to be in any bit of a hurry to get there despite the chill in the air, taking slow strides with his hands shoved in the pockets of his leather jacket. Normally I have to gallop to keep up with him. It’s pissing me off because I’d rather like to get this done and over with, but I don’t say a word. I’m not saying anything until we’re in front of the Mage.

 

I’ve decided that this is a test. If the Mage seems genuinely concerned that I got hurt, then I’ll take it as a sign that he actually cares about my well-being. If not…I’ll figure the rest out later.

 

A few minutes later, we’re being ushered inside the Mage’s office by the gargoyle, who gives Baz the stoniest side-eye I’ve ever seen (pun intended). Baz brushes ahead of me and walks in first, and I follow right behind.

 

“Simon. Basilton,” the Mage says, barely looking up at either of us. “Have a seat, please.”

 

We both sit, Baz settling against one arm of his chair and crossing his legs as elegantly as possible. He’s incapable of sitting normally, probably because he’s so damn tall.

 

“I understand the two of you had an altercation on the stairway in Mummers’ House,” the Mage begins.

 

“You understood correctly,” Baz says with a tilt of his head. I blink as hard as I can at him without drawing the Mage’s attention. He _wants_ the Mage to think we fought?

 

“Would either of you care to elaborate on what happened?”

 

Baz shoots me a look from the corner of his eye; I can hear him hissing _don’t say a word._ And I realize in that moment that I don’t want to. Whatever explanation I’d offer up would only get Baz in more trouble for having that tape recorder, even if it is low-tech compared to a mobile. He’s already had his music taken away. There’s no sense in making things worse if they don’t need to be.

 

I never thought I would live in a world where I would be protecting Baz Pitch from getting into trouble. But here I am.

 

So I keep my mouth shut.

 

“The two of you are meant to live as brothers. Cast together by the Crucible, and sworn by the Anathema not to harm one another. Of course, you were outside your room at the time this happened, but,” the Mage pauses to rub the bridge of his nose, “I would have expected greater maturity from both of you by your fifth year.”

 

I look down at my knees. Baz takes a great interest in examining his fingernails. (Pristine, like the rest of himself. I wonder if he gives himself manicures when I’m not around.)

 

“One more incident like this, Basilton, and I will have to write home to your father.”

 

Baz raises his head and nods once, not breaking eye contact with the Mage. Something in the room shifts, possibly in the magickal atmosphere, and I suppress a shiver that’s chasing down my spine. Obviously I’ve looked the Mage in the eyes before, but never with so much authority. Baz looks like a disdainful prince strewn on his throne, deigning to let some village idiot speak before him. Only the Mage doesn’t seem to realize _he’s_ the idiot here.

 

“I understand,” he replies. “He’ll be looking forward to it. He’s actually been meaning to talk to you about the books of mine you confiscated.”

 

Oh Merlin, he’s going right for it.

 

“Basilton.” I think the Mage is trying to look intimidating by folding his arms over his chest, but it doesn’t really work at all. “Basilton, we’ve been over this. Those books belong to the library.”

 

I know nothing about these books they’re talking about, only that they do actually belong to Headmistress Pitch, or did anyway. When she died, the library claimed anything of academic or magickal importance for the archive (Penny told me), and I assume one of the Pitches snuck in to take back some of it.

 

“Those books were purchased for personal use by my mother. And my father and aunt will be here by the end of term to collect them, as well as the records and devices that you confiscated.”

 

The Mage shakes his head, the crease between his eyebrows deepening. “Oh, no. I’m afraid not. For safety reasons, confiscated items are not returned. I’m sorry, Basilton. But you knew the rules and willingly broke them.”

 

Is he fucking serious? Does he know how many students are walking around with hidden mobiles and laptops after the electronics ban was put into place? Penny’s mum wouldn’t let her be at Watford without a mobile. Agatha has her iPod stashed someplace. For Merlin’s sake, it’s not like the Humdrum could hack a record player.

 

This is nothing more than a power move. A way to hold one over on the Old Families without causing any direct harm. What the Mage doesn’t realize is he _is_ harming someone: me. Baz, too, but me specifically. I wouldn’t have spilled down the stairs if Baz hadn’t been acting so shifty and hiding things, and he isn’t like that when he’s got his music. He’s still a prick, of course, but he’s tolerable most days.

 

“Sir,” I start to say.

 

“This has nothing to do with why you are here today, however,” the Mage continues, looking over Baz. I don’t think he realized I was talking at all.

 

“Sir, what if Baz promises not to fight for the rest of term?” I know I fully sound like a toddler negotiating to get his toy back after time-out, but I don’t care. “What if – if he doesn’t do anything,” like unleash a chimera meant for the Mage in the Wavering Wood that _I_ was put in the crosshairs to deal with, “perhaps you could—”

 

“Simon, wait outside, would you?”

 

Now I _am_ being put in time-out. The way the Mage smiles at me is the same way I’ve seen countless care home ladies smile when the younger kids make a colossal mess. Like they’re trying to make the discipline that’s about to happen more pleasant. Honestly, it’s more terrifying that way.

 

But I’m not scared of the Mage right now. I take it all in—him leaning back in his overstuffed leather office chair, arms crossed over the front of his Robin Hood tunic—and try to suppress every thought I have of scorching this whole place in blue flames. I’ve never burned anything intentionally with my magic before. First time for everything.

 

My magic is leaking out everywhere, because I can see Baz flare his nostrils to sniff the air. For a brief moment I think he might follow me out, but he stays put, trying not to look my way. All right. Let him try to play mind games with the Mage.

 

I hope Baz wins.

 

I lost the red rubber ball that I first brought to Watford years ago, but I really wish I had it now to bounce against the wall in the hallway. Looking back, I think I loved that ball so much because it was a release for all my pent-up energy. I didn’t know that I was literally overflowing with magic back then, so I just kept bouncing the ball until my wrists got tired or I found something else to concentrate on. Right now, I’ve got nothing.

 

Nothing except music to think about.

 

I’ve thought my way all through to the wind-down of “Bohemian Rhapsody”—I got mixed up about how many ‘Galileos’ and ‘Bismillahs’ to put in there—when Baz comes storming out of the Mage’s office. His fists are balled up inside his pockets of his jeans (He had to change into those jeans as soon as the parrot showed up, but didn’t bother with the rest of his uniform. Just another piece of rebellion.) (They look awfully nice on him, those jeans.). And I’m sure if his magic could spill out everywhere like mine, I’d be smelling fire right now.

 

He looks down at me slumped on the floor. Not glaring. Not sneering. Just looking. Drinking me in, almost. I’ve read that vampires allegedly have the power to mesmerize their prey, but I don’t believe it. Probably just coincidence that they all have eyes that shift color and keep you guessing about their true intentions. That’s how it is with Baz.

 

Without a word, he jerks his head toward the door of the Mage’s office and turns down the hallway, footsteps echoing on the marble tiles. I shake my left leg to wake it up after falling asleep, then half-limp back into the office.

 

“Simon,” the Mage says when he hears my feet scuff on the carpet, glancing up from some papers on his desk. As if it would be anyone else. His wards would have gone off if that were the case.

 

I sit down in Baz’s chair. Crossing my legs feels unnatural, but I rest my hands on the arms of the chair instead of my knees like I usually do. Yeah, this feels more powerful already. More confident.

 

“Neither you nor Basilton wished to tell me the details of your fight on the stairs. Although I don’t understand why, I will respect that decision from the two of you.” The Mage presses his fingertips together. “But I do need to know if he hurt you in any way aside from your broken nose.”

 

“My shoulder is a little bruised, sir,” I shrug, “but it’ll heal on its own. I bounce back.”

 

“So you do.” The Mage sighs. “I worry, Simon. The Old Families have never liked my being in power. I knew that I was taking a risk in publically announcing you as my heir, but I thought that they would have enough respect for Watford as an institution to avoid bringing their skirmishes within these walls. Evidently I miscalculated.”

 

“With all due respect,” I say, meaning the absolute bare minimum of respect I can muster, “I don’t think Baz was told by his dad or aunt or whoever to push me down the stairs.”

 

“It wouldn’t be above the Pitches to do so.”

 

“Maybe not, but I can say this for a fact, sir. Baz didn’t push me. I lost my balance and fell.”

 

That’s all the detail I’m giving him. The Mage doesn’t need to know anything else. He’ll take anything he hears and twist it around to fit his own worldview. If he wants to believe the Pitches are using Baz to get to me, fine. He’s bloody wrong. Baz’s aunt might have brought Baz up to be a total punk, but he’s far too smart to not think for himself. I’m almost insulted on his behalf.

 

“You will tell me if Baz does anything else. Anything at all.” The Mage gazes at me over his fingers. “Any plots, any hijinks he plans with his friends.”

 

“What happened to being like brothers, sir?” I ask boldly.

 

“The Pitches were offered an olive branch the moment you and Basilton were drawn together by the Crucible. They’ve chosen to burn that branch.”

 

He’s so full of shit. Full of himself, too, but mostly shit. (That might be redundant.)

 

Just to avoid looking the Mage in the face, I roll my eyes up to the bookshelves towering behind him. What’s sitting on the shelves never changes, really, unless he or I find something on one of our expeditions that he needs close at hand (like the book I got from the selkie beach last year). There is something new up there, though: a familiar beat-up cardboard box with _NAT: BOOKS AND RECORDS_ scrawled on its face. And if I squint hard enough, I can make out a small polished wooden briefcase with speakers sitting next to it on the shelf, unlatched.

 

Merlin and Morgana. Those were sitting right in Baz’s line of sight the entire time he was here, and he couldn’t do a thing about it.

 

My magic flares up again, gushing out of my pores. Come to think of it, the book the Mage has been leaning on looks familiar, too, like it was meant to be sitting on Baz’s desk instead of here. _Asshole._

 

“Is there anything else you needed from me, sir?” I do my best not to cut the last word down to a growl.

 

“Not that I can think of,” the Mage says lightly. If I was being obvious in ogling the bookshelves, he doesn’t say anything about it.

 

“Then if you don’t mind, I’ve loads of homework to attend to.” That’s an out-and-out lie: since the Mage hasn’t had me out on missions, I’ve actually had time to focus on my classes for once. My marks have improved a little because of it.

 

“Off you go, then.”

 

Baz was right. I’m nothing more than the Mage’s pet. And here he is shooing me away like a dog.

 

I barely give him another look as I sweep out the door.

 

****

 

“We’ve got to get Baz’s records back.”

 

Agatha gapes at me and drops her brush full of black nail varnish on the carpet. Penny raises an eyebrow at me while Agatha scrambles for the bottle of acetone to clean up her mess.

 

“What brought that on?” Penny asks, going back to buffing her nails.

 

“Mage,” I answer.

 

Penny clicks her tongue and curls her fingers in on her palm to examine her work. Bless her, she doesn’t press any further than that. I suppose that’s a benefit you get when you’re friends with someone for nearly six years: you can speak in monosyllables and understand each other perfectly.

 

“That’s not much of an explanation,” Agatha huffs. “Why?”

 

“Why what?”

 

“Why do _you_ need to get Baz’s records back? They’re not yours.”

 

“It’s not just records that the Mage took. There are some books, too. Ones that Headmistress Pitch owned.”

 

Penny perks up at that. “They belonged to Headmistress Pitch? Do you know what they were?”

 

“Honestly, I don’t remember them that well. Baz kept reading this one about some vowel shift that happened once over and over.” By the way Penny is rolling her eyes, I can tell there’s something more meaningful behind what I just said than how I described it. “I’d guess she might have written notes inside them. I caught Baz squinting and murmuring spells under his breath one day while he was reading. Spells I’d never heard before.”

 

“Then those books do belong to the school,” Agatha says. She dips her brush back in the varnish and starts painting on my left ring finger. “They’re part of the archives since they contain original ideas of a Watford headmistress.”

 

“They belong to Baz. They’re from his mum.”

 

Agatha ignores me and bends down to tap at the music playlist on her mobile. “The Tide is High” starts playing through her tiny pink Bluetooth speaker—not nearly as high-quality as Baz’s, this one crackles so much. Aggie’s been on a Blondie kick ever since Baz told her she looks like Debbie Harry. I don’t really see the resemblance myself.

 

“Seriously, though. We need to get them back. Records, books, and all.”

 

“You still haven’t said why.”

 

“Even you have to admit that Baz was unfairly targeted, Agatha,” Penny reasons, shaking a bottle of purple varnish. “He’s far from being the only one to have banned items at Watford. You have a mobile. I have a mobile and laptop.”

 

Agatha sighs. “Those are different.”

 

“How?”

 

“You can’t exactly hack a record player,” I offer.

 

“Aside from that,” Penny nods at me, “the Mage has no political motivation to keep literally anyone else with electronics in check. I bet that if he did a random sweep of the school, he’d return belongings to anyone who didn’t have ties to the Grimms or Pitches.”

 

“What does politics have anything to do with this?” Agatha looks about ready to tear her hair out.

 

“ _Everything,_ ” Penny and I chime in together.

 

“Those records had to be, like, Baz’s childhood,” I add. “His aunt Fiona gave him most of those, because they’re definitely older than all of us. When he’s sung along to some of the records, it’s like he’s known those songs his whole life.”

 

(Baz always sings along quietly to himself when he wears his headphones, or when he thinks I’m not listening. Doesn’t have too bad of a voice.)

 

“Pretty sad if paper and vinyl are the only things that made up Baz’s childhood,” Agatha mumbles.

 

White-hot anger sears through my chest and straight up to my ears, burning them pink. I grew up with even _less_ than paper and vinyl to call my own. If Baz and his aunt lived in mock poverty because they thought it was punk or whatever, that was by choice. I never had that choice. Agatha wouldn’t know what going without means: the Wellbeloves live in a world filled with horses and fancy cars and lavish houses. All better than anything I grew up having.

 

“Yeah, well, considering all I had was a red rubber ball to my name when I came to Watford, I think Baz made out a damn sight better than I did.”

 

I must look more pissed off than I feel, or maybe my voice comes out growling. Either way, Agatha’s looks like she’s about to drop more black varnish on the carpet.

 

“Oh, no, Simon! I didn’t mean—”

 

“You meant it,” I snap. “Don’t pretend you didn’t.”

 

Agatha’s face breaks like a china doll. With a hastily mumbled “excuse me,” she darts out of the room, presumably to the bathroom down the hall, and slams the door hard behind her. More black varnish bleeds out onto some tissues where she dropped the brush, and her mobile’s playlist rolls over from “The Tide is High” to “Heart of Glass.” I didn’t know newer mobiles came with an irony setting.   

 

“Well done, Simon,” Penny blinks at me, impressed.

 

“I just went off on my girlfriend. How is that well done?”

 

“She needs to be reminded of her privilege every so often. If anyone should do it, it’s you.”

 

“I’ve got so much on my plate as it is.”

 

Penny rolls her eyes at me and finishes off her purple thumbnail with a flourish. “I _will_ help you, by the way.”

 

“Help me with what?”

 

“Getting Baz’s records and books back, of course. You said they were in the Mage’s office, right?”

 

I swallow hard. “You’ve got that look in your eye, Penny. The plotting look. I don’t like it.”

 

“The good news is that the Mage has the two of us as exceptions to his protective wards so we can come and go when we want to,” she says, tapping a freshly painted nail on her cheek. “I highly doubt he changed that after last year with the selkies. At any rate, we should be able to get in just fine if we know the Mage is gone.”

 

“But we don’t know when that will be. And if we’re inside his office, we have no way of knowing if he suddenly decides to show up on a whim.”

 

“Then we need a lookout. Someone who would be willing to help us carry some of the things back to your room, too, and who’s good at dodging authority figures without raising suspicion.”

 

“Merlin, Pen, we’re not planning _Mission Impossible_ here.”

 

“When have I ever steered you wrong with my strategizing, Simon?” Penny does her thing where she lets her glasses fall down the bridge of her nose and stares at me over her pointy frames. It’s so unsettling, she knows it’s unsettling, and it makes me want to crawl out of my skin.

 

“Never,” I reply, which is true. I’d be dead several times over from the Mage’s quests if it weren’t for Penny’s help.

 

“Exactly. I’ll think of someone who can help us—not Agatha—” she says pointedly, sliding over in front of me and taking my left hand, “and we’ll take it from there. In the meantime, let’s see how thick she decided to paint your nails.”

 

****

 

“Fucking _Niall_?”

 

“Keep your voice down,” Penny hisses at me. Our Cultural Studies professor shoots us a look—we’re supposed to be watching _Love, Actually_ and taking notes—so I lower my voice a bit and inch closer to Penny.

 

“Of all the people you could have picked to help us,” I hiss back at her, “you picked Niall fucking Kelly.”

 

“He’s not one of the bad ones.”

 

“He’s one of Baz’s mates!”

 

“Niall is _approachable_ ,” Penny says with a toss of her hair. She draws an exaggerated frowny face in her notes when Alan Rickman slips into the jewelry store on screen. “And he doesn’t look out of place no matter where he is. There’s a pedestrian confidence about him.”

 

“I seriously can’t tell if that’s meant to be an insult or a compliment.”

 

“It’s a comment on how good of a lookout he’ll be.”

 

I lean on my hand and scribble down a few notes about the movie (Rowan Atkinson just showed up randomly—I need to give this movie another watch at some point to follow along with all the stories), then let out a long sigh. It’s pointless to argue with Penny when she’s got her mind set on something.

 

“Seriously, Niall and I haven’t had a reason to talk to each other since third year at least,” I tell her as a last-ditch attempt. “Baz will get suspicious if he catches us.”

 

 _Then talk fast,_ Penny underlines on her notebook paper.

 

Luckily, Niall and I happen to have Astrology together the next day, and it’s one of the few classes where Baz and I don’t attend the same time period—he goes right after lunch, I go later in the afternoon, right before tea. I corner Niall after class under the pretext of asking him some random question about the lesson (why do planets have aspects anyway?), but then I cut right to the chase.

 

I’m surprised by how quickly he catches on.

 

“We’ve got to do _something_ ,” he says, tossing his bangs out of his eyes. Somehow he didn’t join the rest of the fifth-year wave in cutting our hair. “I went to see Baz and Fiona at Christmastime, and he was all out of sorts then. Fiona had to spell the piano lid shut so he’d stop banging out angry songs all day. Music isn’t something he just listens to, y’know? He lives it. He loves it.”

 

“He’s a moody bastard without it,” I add.

 

“Not that he isn’t _with_ the music,” Niall shrugs, “but he’s more tolerable.”

 

I can’t help but crack a smile at that. I should always give Penny more credit than I do. For all her antisocial tendencies, she’s good at sniffing people out, and she was right. Niall is one of the good ones.

 

I quickly outline the plan to him for us to meet up after breakfast on Saturday morning. Baz will be at football practice until lunch, and the Mage will still be gone with the Mage’s Men—we actually heard from Miss Possibelf that he wouldn’t be back until next Monday at least—so our path would be clear. Just in case, though, Niall would keep a lookout and verify that Penny and I had taken everything that belonged to Baz. Then we would split up the load between the three of us and get it all back to Mummer’s House before we got caught.

 

“Why do we have to split it up?” Niall wrinkles his nose. “What could happen?”

 

“Penny likes to plan for the unpredictable,” I answer, which is true. In our five years at Watford, she’s learned to leave enough room in our schemes to allow for anything that could possibly go sideways and still have an exit strategy. A ruthless tactician, she is.

 

We go our separate ways after that. Later that night in the library, Penny tells me that she managed to recruit Agatha to our plan with a very small role, one that has the least risk of getting in trouble.

 

“If Baz asks, it was all her idea,” Penny explains, paging through her Spanish textbook (she’s learning the language at Watford to keep up with Micah’s family, which I think is sweet). “Obviously we’ll have to let it slip that you told Agatha about the missing records in the first place, but as far as Baz needs to know, she came to me and set the plan in motion. You had nothing to do with this.”

 

Part of me is a little peeved that I’m being left out this way. The more I think about it, the more I kind of _want_ Baz to know I was the one behind getting his records back. I’m not an idiot; I know doing this won’t magically make Baz less of an insufferable prick. But I’d like to think that maybe, just maybe, he could see the gesture for what it is: a peace offering. Although I haven’t completely forgiven him for what he said about the Mage, I would like to have our relationship be a little closer to civil. We _are_ roommates, after all. We’re supposed to get on so we at least don’t kill each other.

 

(I try not to think about how I might have to kill him when all is said and done in this war. Given the opportunity now, I’d rather drop my sword and surrender. But Baz doesn’t need to know that. He’d just call me soft and take full advantage.)

 

Agatha sweeps into the library, all done up in her pink scarf and Baz’s old jean jacket. She doesn’t say hello to me or Penny, just swings her bag off her shoulder and slides into the chair next to Baz, where he’s hunched over some essay (he even hunches with class, the bastard).

 

Baz raises an eyebrow at me, silently asking for an explanation for the sudden chill between Agatha and me. I flip a page in my notebook and pretend I don’t notice him.

 

****

 

I spend the rest of the week in near silence when Baz is around. We slide past each other like ghosts during our morning routines, and I don’t complain as usual when he takes such ungodly long showers. Scratching pen nibs over paper and the occasional sigh are the only noises that happen during our joint study sessions. And when Baz slips in for the night after going out to feed, I pretend I’m asleep and watch him through my eyelashes as he crawls into bed.

 

I can tell he’s confused by how quiet I am. But I’ve never been good at forcing small talk, and that would honestly raise more suspicion than what I’m doing now. Although I don’t look like it on the outside (at least I don’t think I do), it feels like I have a ball of lightning in my chest, crackling with anticipation. And I know that if I let myself say even a sentence to him, I’d say too much and the plan would go up in smoke.

 

So I keep quiet, but it’s so, _so_ hard.

 

When Baz goes down to the Catacombs, I go up on the roof of Mummers House. Since we’ve been banned from walking the grounds after the chimera incident, I’ve taken to walking along the ramparts and tiptoeing around the spires. It’s dangerous as hell, especially when the wind gets going, but I like the way it feels when the air is swirling all around me. Like my magic is charging, only it’s not going to hurt anyone.

 

I can also let out some energy up out here and sing with no one listening in. Baz gets annoyed when I sing in the shower—he bumps around and swears a lot to cover up the sound—so I try not to do it as often as I once did. Pigeons don’t mind if I’m off-key or if I skip lines that I don’t quite remember, anyway.

 

Out of every band in Baz’s library of records, we can always agree on Queen. I love how big every one of their songs feel, like I can huddle down between the riffing guitar and snappy drums and thrumming bass and all four of their voices soaring above it all, and for once I don’t have to be the colossal center of attention. I can be insignificant. Lighthearted. Free.

 

“ _I want to break free_ ,” I whisper into the night air. “ _I want to break free. I want to break free from your lies, you’re so self-satisfied, I don’t neeeeeeeeeed you. I’ve got to break free…_ ”

 

The Mage really is self-satisfied, isn’t he? While I’m not convinced that he’s done an entirely hack job at running the World of Mages (letting any creature who could speak with magic into Watford was pretty nice, and the taxes paid by the Old Families redistribute wealth to some extent), he’s still got this singular vision of how the World should look. And if he’s got to smash the Old Families into obscurity to make his visions happen, then he seems more than happy to do it. Things go his way, or no way at all.

 

“ _God knows, God knows I want to break free!_ ”

 

Not everything has to be a fight. And I don’t want to keep getting thrown into the battlefield.

 

“ _I’ve fallen in love,_ ” I sing to one of the gargoyles I walk past. “ _I’ve fallen in love for the first time, and this time I know it’s for real._ ”

 

I know I haven’t fallen in love with Agatha, not lately. We haven’t talked for almost a full week now, which we’ve done before, but this time feels like something major shifted between us. No matter how much we snog or chatter about small things, we’ll always be fundamentally different people. I know I love her, and I think she loves me, but we don’t really understand each other that well. There was probably a moment where I fell for her when we were about twelve years old, but I hit rock bottom almost immediately. You don’t really know yourself all that well, so there’s not much _to_ fall in love with beyond the surface.

 

We’re probably headed for another break-up, or as Agatha likes to call it, “some time away from us.” She never wants to actually break up, because that’s too final. Part of me is relieved; part of me wishes we could get it over with already.

 

I forgot how much of this song is about love, damn it all. Should have thought of something less sentimental—I’m getting too deep into myself.

 

Eh, might as well keep going. I’m this far into the song already.

 

“ _It’s straaaaaaaaaaange, but it’s true. Hey! I can’t get over the way you love me like you do,_ ” I serenade another gargoyle while stroking a finger over its horns. The first gargoyle seems to glare at me in jealousy. “ _But I have to be sure, when I walk out that door!_ _Oh, how I want to be free, baby…_ ”

 

That must be a nice thing to have: love that feels like an anchor. Even if it makes little sense to anyone else on the outside, you always have that stability with another person that draws you back to center. I used to imagine Agatha was my bastion, but I see know that’s not going to last forever. The only person I can be sure feels a certain kind of way about me is Baz, and it’s definitely not love that he feels. It’s not really hate anymore, either, though.

 

He thinks I don’t remember the afternoon when he found me high off the standing stone fog. He thinks I don’t remember listening to “Space Oddity” with him and watching each other from our own beds while the sun set over us both. I still get a weird pang in my gut whenever I think of that afternoon. Something between us seemed to click into place, yet neither of us seem able or willing to figure out what exactly that something was.

 

I’m pretty sure we’re friends. If we are, I like that more than being enemies.

 

I hum my way through the guitar and synthesizer solos, picking my way over to a new set of gargoyles. The wind is really starting to pick up now, and Baz is probably back from the Catacombs by now, wondering where the hell I am. I’ll head in soon. Just have one last thing to do.

 

The clasp on the chain around my neck keeps slipping out of my fingers, but I get it undone after a few tries and more than a bit of swearing. I let the cross dangle in front of me from my fist, the golden edges flashing in the starlight. Dr. Wellbelove gave the cross to me over Christmas break. Honestly, I don’t remember if I brought up the possibility of Baz being a vampire, or if Agatha maybe said something to her dad while I was out of the room. In any case, I came back to Watford wearing it. And now I don’t really feel like I need it anymore. Somehow, a bloodsucking vampire as my roommate and sworn enemy is the least threatening person in my life at the moment.

 

(I do feel bad for that night where I asked Baz who he was in the middle of that thunderstorm, like some kind of bad horror movie villain. He saw the cross, I know he did—his throat corded up like he was choking on his tongue.)

 

There’s a brief moment where I consider throwing the necklace over the eaves to the merewolves swarming around in the moat below. (Wonder if they would flinch and snap at it, if it’s truly a ward against dark creatures.) But Agatha would be pissed if I just tossed away something so valuable to her family. Instead, I drop the necklace into my pocket and make my way to the trapdoor in the roof leading back inside.

 

****

Saturday comes both all too soon and not fast enough. Penny has to keep a hand on my forearm so I stop gorging myself on scrambled eggs and toast at breakfast (“Baz is _watching you_ ,” she says bracingly, which he was), but I manage to down three cups of black tea to make up for it. I’m buzzing a bit on caffeine by the time Baz leaves for football practice and Penny feels comfortable leaving the dining hall to meet Niall.

 

“All right?” Niall greets us, raising his hand. His wand is tucked up the sleeve of his stretched-out black jumper.

 

Penny shrugs, and it looks so much like me that I want to call her out on it (“Not everyone can interpret gesture, Simon. Use your words.”), but I hold off. “Can’t complain much. Ready, Simon?”

 

I nod, though it probably looks more like a Chihuahua twitching thanks to the caffeine rushing through my blood. “Let’s get on with it.”

 

There is really no nonchalant way to go to the headmaster’s office on a Saturday morning. Niall, however, keeps slinking around like he’s in an episode of Scooby Doo, peering around open doorways and darting past when he’s sure no one else is looking. I press my fist to my mouth to stop the nervous giggles threatening to come out.

 

“ _Honestly_ , Niall.” Penny turns around after Niall crouches like he’s about to tuck and roll past the library. “Just what are you doing?”

 

Niall blinks at her. “Secret mission, isn’t it? Shouldn’t we be more secretive?”

 

“Yes, but you’re being distracting. The key to being stealthy is acting like you meant to be exactly where you are at all times. No one will suspect you then.” She pushes her glasses back up the bridge of her nose and leads us to the end of the hallway, then left up the stairs that spiral up to the top floor of the tower and the Mage’s office.

 

“She’s a bit scary,” Niall whispers to me. “Intimidating.”

 

I shrug. “I’m used to it.”

 

“Fuck the Chosen One. We should just have Penelope Bunce polish off the Humdrum and be done with it. With her wits and magic, that thing would be smoke and ash by lunchtime. No offense to you, mate.”

 

As if I haven’t thought that same thing over and over since our first year.

 

Normally, the protective wards surrounding the headmaster’s quarters can’t be let down without the current headmaster manually adjusting the magic to let you in. Every successive headmaster adds their own layer to the wards—something with how their magical aura interacts with the auras left behind by previous generations—and the Mage went and added a ton more of his own, so the air is thick with enchantment. That’s why most students never see the inside of the Mage’s office. Working and reworking the atmosphere every time a student comes and goes would drain a lot of energy.

 

I’m one of the exceptions, being the Mage’s Heir. And once it became clear that Penny was a package deal with me after my first-year adventure, the Mage made her an exception, too. We’re the only ones in all of Watford, professors included, who don’t have to wait for the gargoyle to bow and step aside for us. We just have to run headlong into its chest and we’ll pop out right in the main office.

 

“Keep your eyes open,” Penny nods at Niall. “Don’t get complacent. And ping me if there’s any trouble.”

 

Niall cocks his head. “Ping you?”

 

“Oh, don’t pretend you haven’t got a mobile stuffed into those skinny jeans of yours. I know you must.”

 

Looking down at the floor, Niall pulls a shiny black mobile out of his back pocket, just enough for Penny to see the lockscreen. A photo of him, Dev, and Baz all mashed together, sitting on the floor of our room—I recognize the carpeting. Baz is actually smiling a bit for once. The whole thing’s rather sweet, really.

 

“Exactly. Simon and I will be back.” She jerks her head at me, ponytail bouncing behind her, and we both rush for the gargoyle at the same time, the wards washing over us like a hot shower first thing in the morning.

 

I’ve been in the Mage’s office when he hasn’t been here before. That’s nothing new. But I’m always surprised by how much dust seems to gather whenever he’s gone, even when it’s just for a few days.

 

“Did you say it’s just one box and the record player?” Penny squints up at the shelf where I first spotted _NAT: BOOKS AND RECORDS_ almost a week before.

 

“That’s only the one box I saw,” I clarify, scanning the room. There’s no telling where the Mage may have scattered the books he confiscated, though. I can see one sitting on his desk now, a poetry anthology, right in front of his computer. Shit. We can’t take that one—it’s too obvious.

“We’ll start with it, then.” Penny grabs a stool sitting next to one of the other bookshelves and drags it behind the Mage’s desk, reaching for the box on her tiptoes. “Take the record player first, actually, would you?”

 

I do, taking the wooden suitcase and setting it gingerly down on the floor (not on the edge, like a real valise, but on the bottom, like you’re about to pack it). Penny hefts the box of Headmistress Pitch’s records onto the desk with a bang that makes me cringe and hops down from the stool, dusting off her skirt.

 

We find some brand new file folders in the dented green file cabinet sitting next to the door. Penny beams—she was worried we wouldn’t be able to do the copying spell she’d been practicing all week. She plucks the first record out of the box, Prince straddling a purple motorcycle on slick pavement, and waves her ring over a blank folder.

 

“ ** _Prepare for trouble, and make it double_** ,” she mutters. The folder transforms into a perfect replica of _Purple Rain_ , and she sets the original in another spot on the desk.

 

“Where did you even learn that spell, anyway?”

 

“Pokémon.”

 

“Ahhh.” We watched the first movie for Cultural Studies, but I could never really get into it. Once you’ve stared an actual dragon in the face, a Charizard loses all its threatening potential.

 

We shuffle our way about halfway through the box—Headmistress Pitch owned _every_ Billy Joel and Elton John record, including the greatest hits albums—before Penny waves me off to go find Baz’s books. I pull out a folded list I’d made of every book title I could think of, but admittedly I never got a good look at many of the things Baz read. Some of them looked like old grimoires, some looked like dog-eared copies of Shakespeare plays, and who knows what the others were.

 

Thankfully, the Mage wasn’t too creative in hiding the books anywhere. I find about six of them shoved together on the other side of his main bookshelf, and another two sitting on top of yet another file cabinet (I have never once seen the Mage hold anything that looked remotely like a file. Ever. The cabinets are a completely mystery to me.) I pile every one of the books up and run them out to where Niall is waiting. He jumps when I poke my head out of the gargoyle’s chest, an earbud falling out of one ear.

 

“What do you suggest I do with these?” he asks when I heft the whole stack at him.

 

I roll my eyes. “Look innocent,” I say, ducking back inside.

 

Penny is about three-quarters of the way through the box of records now, and the pile in front of her is frighteningly tall. I can hear Baz grousing about how the excess weight of each successive record could bend or snap the vinyl on the bottom one, so I take about half the pile and set it next to the record player on the floor. Lou Reed’s heavily shadowed eyes leer up at me from the cover of _Transformer_ , and I leer right back before flipping the album over. Baz might be enthralled with him, but he creeps me out.

 

“Find everything?” Penny asks in between casting her copying spell on _ABBA: The Album_ and _A Day at the Races._

 

“Almost.” I scratch the back of my neck, unsure of where else to look. “There’s this weird linguistics book that Baz read all the time, but I can’t remember what it’s called. Something about the Great Vowel Shift.”

 

“‘Shift Happens: A Voluminous Analysis of the Great Vowel Shift and English Spellwork’?”

 

“How did you—” I shake my head. “Never mind. With a title that long, I’ll probably trip over it while looking for the book.”

 

“It’s a classic!” Penny yells at me as I slip behind the bookshelves again.

 

After another five minutes, I do find _Shift Happens_ tucked on the bottom shelf where the Mage stashed every other confiscated thing from Baz. The spine is so thick I can barely wrap my hand around it, but I’ve already decided that I’ll be responsible for carrying this back to the room myself. Baz has read this book cover to cover multiple times, so it must mean something special to him.

 

Penny sets the final record from the box, _Diamond Dogs_ , on a third pile of real albums and chucks the file folder copy on the Mage’s desk. “There. Now all that’s left is the box.”

 

“You’re a miracle worker, Pen. Seriously. I owe you.”

 

“I’m not the kind of person to keep score on who owes people what. Our friendship isn’t transactional, Simon.” Penny bites the inside of her cheek as she copies the cardboard box and starts flinging file-folder albums into the somehow shabbier duplicate. “I don’t owe Baz anything, if you think about it. Yet here I am, doing this so that you can make him happy.”

 

I grab a handful of copied albums and throw them into the box, too. “I’m not doing this to make Baz happy.”

 

“You called him a miserable twat. Several times.”

 

“That was me stating a fact! Tell me I’m wrong.”

 

Penny gives me a long, searching look, then turns back to the copies. She looks like I just answered a question she never asked me, and it makes me nervous.

 

We finish packing everything up, Penny sets the record player in my arms along with _Shift Happens_ , and she hefts the box of records on her hip. Niall is surprised to see us out of the Mage’s office so quick, I think. He yanks his earbuds out by the cord (Penny cringes) and pulls his wand out of his jumper sleeve.

 

“ ** _Nothing to see here_** ,” he says, pointing at me. I catch a whiff of bacon as his magic melts over the pile in my arms and turns everything invisible.

 

“Brilliant idea, Niall,” I tell him as he casts the same spell on the box Penny is holding. “But don’t you think it might look a little odd for us to be carrying big piles of nothing? I’ve got to hold my arms out like this all the way to Mummers House.”

 

“As if you haven’t walked through Watford looking like a complete tit before.”

 

“You would know, wouldn’t you? Considering you have daily experience.”

 

“Can you two please wait until we get all this dropped off before you go at each other?” Penny sighs. Her cape is draped over the arm holding the invisible box of records, which makes her look a bit like Batman about to soar over Gotham City. But I definitely look more ridiculous. As Niall so kindly implied, I’ve sloughed through the hallways soaked through with blood (sometimes mine, usually magical creatures’) and half-dead. Could be worse.

 

And so we set off with our contraband.

           

****

When you’ve spent most of your life reacting to things on a hair trigger, it’s so bloody hard trying to act nonchalant. Much harder than anyone would be willing to give me credit for.

 

Baz is in the dining hall already when I arrive, squinting over a cup of tea like he always does when he’s thinking too hard. I hold my head up high and walk right past his table without blinking, which is probably not really acting natural, but I’m wound too tight to care very much. He watches me go by and doesn’t look away until I’m sitting down at my own table with some tea and a stack of scones on my plate.

 

I make a bigger show than usual of loading my scones up with butter before jamming them in my mouth, if only because I know it makes Baz wrinkle his nose in disgust. Wonder if he’s ever enjoyed eating anything in his life, or if he’s too posh to.

 

Right on cue, Penny and Agatha sail in, Niall trailing close behind. The look of pure bewilderment on Baz’s face is so hilarious I want to laugh, but he’s cut his eyes over at me as if to ask _what the fuck is the meaning of this?_ I stop myself from shrugging (it enrages him, how much I shrug) and opt to frown instead.

 

Penny launches into her prepared lecture to Baz, hitting every beat just like she rehearsed it with me last night. I don’t really agree with what she says about his mum (“Do you really want to go that low, Pen? Using his mum against him?” “He shoved you down the _stairs_ , Simon! Unless you’ve forgotten already.”). I’ve never seen Baz slouch in my life, but now he’s sitting up ramrod straight, intent on Penny’s every word. She’s dangerous like this—I swear if she ever turned evil, Pen would be a ruthless and efficient cult leader.

 

There is one line Penny says that hit me in the gut every time she repeated it last night, and I can tell when it hits Baz. I’ve never seen him flutter his eyelashes like that before.

 

 _Simon doesn’t have to be your enemy._  

 

(I asked her what exactly she meant by saying that. She only mumbled, “The truth,” before pulling her pencil out of her bun and scratching out another part of the speech in her notebook. I spent the rest of the night fighting off the butterflies in my stomach. I only admitted to myself on the rooftop that I’d rather be friends than enemies with Baz. How the hell did Penny know?)

 

Agatha pats Baz on the shoulder, which doesn’t make my insides roil like it used to, and both she and Penny come over to join me. Penny’s eyes shine like she’s just won the lotto and been elected to the Coven in the same day.

 

“That went _amazingly_ well,” she gushes as Agatha sips at her tea. “All that’s left is for Niall to misdirect Baz into thinking it was all Agatha’s idea.”

 

“He could still puzzle it out, you know,” I remind Penny when she snatches a scone and the butter knife from my plate. “He’s wicked smart.”

 

“I’m smarter.”

 

Agatha doesn’t say anything, but she gazes at me over the rim of her teacup. There’s a question waiting in her eyes, though I feel like she’ll wait when we’re alone to ask me.

 

Baz yelps “ _What?!_ ” so loudly it echoes off the rafters of the dining hall. At least ten people nearby turn to look at him, but his face smooths out and he leans in closer to Dev and Niall like he never lost his composure. I’ve never heard Baz yelp before. Sounds like an excited fox.

 

“Aaaaaand Niall seals the deal,” Penny bites into her scone, satisfied. I can’t read lips to save my life, but Niall’s hands are fluttering around, so I have to guess he’s laying deep into his concocted explanation. Dev blinks like he was lost about five minutes ago, while Baz has his forehead balanced gently on his fingertips, staring down at the table and trying to work out what Niall is saying.

 

And then he’s stalking over to our table. Oh, Merlin. Penny fixes me with a look over her textbook that says _act natural_ , so I shove a scone in my mouth and chew. Really, it was the only distraction I could think of.

 

“Bunce,” Baz says, stopping at the end of our table. Penny deigns to turn her head and raise an eyebrow, which is as much of a hello as she can offer when you interrupt her reading.

 

“Thank you,” he continues, clearing his throat. What he’s thanking her for is unspoken, but everyone understands. “You too, Ags.”

 

A tiny flare of anger lights in my chest—he stole my nickname for her—but Agatha is positively glowing, her foot bouncing up and down next to mine under the table. Penny rolls her eyes and goes back to her book.

 

“And, Snow…”

 

I hate it when he trails off. Baz does this all the time when we’re in the room and studying, trying to goad me into answering study guide questions or reviewing a passage I just read. But I can feel his eyes burning into me, so I decide to give him what he wants. I stare right back up at him.

 

Wait. His eyes are watering. Is he…?

 

“Thank you for what you said the other day in the Mage’s office.” His throat sounds thick like he’s coming down with a cold. “It was decent of you.”

 

Well, how the fuck am I supposed to respond to that? No words come to mind. Instead, I swallow the soggy clod of scone stuck to the roof of my mouth and try not to splutter when, shockingly, it won’t all slide down in one go.

 

Baz’s cheeks are burning pink (he must have fed after football practice), and he swallows hard enough to make his Adam’s apple bob (he even swallows all posh, most of the time). He nods at us all without saying anything else, then spins on his heel and heads for the door, not even bothering to say goodbye to Dev and Niall. He’s a man on a mission; absolutely no one can or will get in his way. I understand completely.

 

“So what was it that you said to the Mage about Baz?” Penny prods me after the general air of drama around our table has evaporated.

 

I pour myself some tea and debate how I’m going to answer.

 

****

 

I give Baz and our room a wide berth for the rest of the day. Ebb is glad to see me—I really need to visit her more often—and she lets me kneel out in the field with her goats, petting and playing with the new kids she birthed just a few weeks ago. They’re all cute little things, goat kids, and they climb me like I’m the tallest hill in the area. By the time I head back to Mummer’s Hall, I’m covered in muck and goat hair, and my stomach is growling like an angry polecat. I’ll need to change before dinner. Penny will side-eye me something fierce if I don’t.

 

When I open the door, possibly the strangest sight in all of Watford’s history greets me.

 

Baz is out cold on his bed, flopped onto his stomach. One arm is dangling over the side of the bed, fingertips barely brushing the floor (he’s so long, everywhere on his body). He never gelled his hair like he normally does after practice, so it hangs mostly over his face and flutters every time he snores. Merlin, he’s _snoring._ If he ever found out he made such an undignified sound, he’d probably set himself on fire. Or maybe he would think it’s punk to snore. I can never tell with Baz.

 

The needle on the record player slips onto a new track, and a bubbly synthesizer line wafts out into the room, followed by heavy, unsteady bass. Oh, this is Talking Heads. “Once in a Lifetime.” Baz loves Talking Heads. I know he’s got a hard-on for Bowie, but David Byrne has to be a damn close second with the way he raves on about his musical genius. I can get into some of Talking Heads’ stuff, but I have to be in the right mood to hear it.

 

Ah, what the hell. This has already been a weird day. Talking Heads sounds bloody reasonable at this point.

 

I drop my bag next to my desk and flop down on my bed. The springs squeak, but Baz doesn’t wake up. Instead, he swipes some of the hair out from in front of his face and wrinkles his nose before letting his hand drop back over the side of the bed. Tear tracks shine all down his cheek in the later afternoon light. So he _was_ about to cry down in the dining hall earlier. He must have come pounding back up here and spent the day playing record after record, sobbing because he was so happy to have his music back.

 

I don’t know what to do with that mental image. My stomach flips at the thought of Baz crying alone, although I know he’d do everything possible to shove me off if I caught him at it. He doesn’t have to do everything by himself. Hell, I’m the Chosen One, and I would be nothing without Penny’s help. Everyone in this world has someone to tug them along.

 

Do I even know how to be comforting? Agatha doesn’t like it when I stroke her hair—she says I’m too rough and I end up frizzing it somehow (probably my magic). I think Baz would like it, though. He’s awfully proud of his hair, and it’s so long and thick. I could rub little circles into his scalp while he leans into my shoulder and works out all his tears. We wouldn’t have to talk. Like always, we could let the music do the talking for us.

 

We should talk eventually, Baz and I. There’s something growing between us, something I still can’t name. If I didn’t know better, I’d call it a crush. How fucked up would that be, though? He’s made it clear so many times that I’m not welcome in the World of Mages, not a part of his elite group of Old Family kids who know all the magic words to a cushioned life.

 

And yet…I think he’s the only one who really understands me. Penny knows me, but Baz can crawl under my skin like no one else. You can only do that to people you really _get_.

 

Maybe it is a crush. I know I felt something like butterflies when I first saw Agatha, though what I’m feeling now isn’t nervous fluttering at all. It’s more like someone lit a candle in my chest and set it right under my lungs. Every breath leaves me warmer inside; I feel like I could rise up on wings if I had them. _Light a match inside your heart, then blow on the tinder._ Not quite the same thing, but close.

 

The Talking Heads moan about letting the days go by and water flowing underground, and then David Byrne murmurs _same as it ever was_ about 50 times, which I’m sure could be a spell for organizing your room in a pinch if you could ever get the inflection right. I want to laugh when he says _there is water at the bottom of the ocean!_ like it’s the most profound discovery mankind has ever made. He’s so weird. Talking Heads is so fucking weird. The synthesizer keeps looping on itself, and I’m starting to feel hypnotized, like I’ve come back from the standing stones again.

 

Baz stirs on his bed, smacking his lips together. He raises his head up a bit off the mattress and blinks at me long and slow. His eyes are all soft, wide pupils surrounded by a sliver of dark grey—they always look this color right after he wakes up in the morning.

 

“Hey,” he whispers, not even bothering with my last name for a greeting. The small smile on his face makes the candle in my chest sputter.

 

“Hey,” I whisper back, because I can’t think of a cleverer thing to say.

 

“Music’s back.”

 

“I can hear that, yeah.”

 

“’M so glad.” Baz stretches his legs, stockinged toes pointed to the end of his bed (Merlin and Morgana, he’s so fucking long), and presses the heel of his hand into one eye. “I was going mad without it.”

 

“Short trip for you.”

 

He lets that comment slide without a nasty retort, so he’s definitely still sleepy. As if to prove my point, he curls back up like a kitten and yawns hugely. “What’re you doing here? Lunch isn’t over yet.”

 

“Baz, it’s nearly dinnertime.”

 

“Bullshit.” Baz grabs his mobile from the table next to his bed and hisses when the bright light hits his face. He groans when he actually reads the clock. “Time is such a shit concept, Snow.”

 

“Agreed.”

 

“Are you hungry?”

 

I nod, but I make no move toward the door.

 

“Get me a sandwich when you’re down there, please? No mustard, for fuck’s sake.”

 

“Didn’t realize I’d become your delivery boy,” I shoot back with a grin.

 

“Just do it.”

 

“Will I get a tip?”

 

“Your tip is that you’ll keep me in a good mood as long as my music doesn’t get taken away, you prat.” There’s no bite behind his words, though. If anything, Baz is smiling more than before. At me. He’s never shown even a remote bit of happiness toward me.

 

I roll my eyes and get up off the bed. Honestly, just a sandwich for dinner sounds fine by me, too. I have a feeling he’s going to sneak off and feed while I’m down in the dining hall, which doesn’t unsettle me as much as I thought it might. When he gets back, we can listen to anything Baz wants on the record player or his speaker, and I won’t complain about his music choices one bit.

 

David Byrne is hammering me with questions as I let the door to our room swing closed behind me.

 

_And you may ask yourself_

_What is that beautiful house?_

_And you may ask yourself_

_Where does that highway go to?_

_And you may ask yourself_

_Am I right? Am I wrong?_

_And you may say to yourself, “My God! What have I done?”_

           

I’m not an idiot. Baz is sleepy enough that he likely won’t remember the conversation we just had, or that he was playing music in the room when I walked in. He’ll go back to snarking with Dev and Niall like tonight never happened, and I’ll have to pretend that we weren’t soft with one another over Talking Heads (as soft as we could ever be, anyway). The music magically reappearing will have to be news to me.

 

Things aren’t the same as they ever were. Something’s shifted. And I think I like it.

 

**Author's Note:**

> SONGS REFERENCED IN THIS FIC (songs not listed here should be identifiable within the body of the story) 
> 
> "Don't Stop Me Now" - Queen
> 
> "Mama Said Knock You Out" - LL Cool J
> 
> "Bohemian Rhapsody" - Queen
> 
> "The Tide is High" - Blondie
> 
> "Heart of Glass" - Blondie
> 
> "I Want to Break Free" - Queen
> 
> "Space Oddity" - David Bowie
> 
> "Once in a Lifetime" - Talking Heads
> 
>  
> 
> ALBUMS REFERENCED IN THIS FIC
> 
> Purple Rain - Prince
> 
> Transformer - Lou Reed
> 
> ABBA: The Album - ABBA
> 
> A Day at the Races - Queen
> 
> Diamond Dogs - David Bowie
> 
> ~~~~  
> I actually would have had this posted about a month ago, but I ended up rewriting the bulk of it; only the first two sections and the last two sections are somewhat intact from the original draft. There were a lot of words and a handful of scenes that ended up being cut for one reason or another, yet somehow I still ended up with over 10K words. Seems like Simon REALLY wanted to tell this story.
> 
> As always, thank you for reading.


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